I was able to attend Vatican Splendors and one of the things which was absolutely fascinating was the Cree Catechism. Talk about a nifty tool for Catholic evangelism… but short of the exhibit I saw at the Minnesota History Center, it seems its dropped off the planet. Its really too bad, as the potential seems so incredible, albeit obviously the text would need to be translated into a different languages.

Now, being this is a Lutheran blog, why discuss a Catholic evangelism tool… Well, there is a problem imho. Sacremental based Christianity, such as Catholicism, Lutheranism, Anglicanism, etc doesnt lend itself to bullet points such as prevalent in other faiths theology. Ie things like the 4 Spiritual Laws, the Navigators etc. For us, the Gospel is life, not a series of steps, where in one gets fire insurance and walks away in the worse case, to the best case where someone gets on fire and has a great lifelong walk with Christ, yet still carries remnants of a theology which may or may not come back to bite them. Dont get me wrong, some Lutheran churches do use the 4 Spiritual Laws and the Navigator tools or their likeness… but then correct the theology in follow up… But why do we have to present problematic theology from the get go?

And thats what got me thinking about this Cree Catechism. Its a pictorial presentation of the Gospel, and it presents key Catholic doctrine pictorially on a colored scroll. Sure, its not as concise as bullet points, but I believe the images do a good service to Catholic theology, esp the unchurched, and with the doctrinal concepts covered visually as well… talk about a great tool for evangelism!

Now, some Lutheran take the view that all we need is scripture, some go so far as to even condemn overhead projectors/technology in worship. And in many ways I can sort of agree… yet, to not use the arts, to not use our understanding of the human mind, cultures, and technology to present the Gospel I think causes us to be a lot less effective than we could be. Remember how Paul preached in Acts… he met people where they were at, even preached all night. Had there been some tools available to assist, I can’t help but think he would have been an early adopter. Thus, I dont think its appropriate to nay say other ways of doing things… even Paul rejoiced when others preached the Gospel out of envy. Thus, even if a guy got rich off of a late night informercial multimedia theologically correct Gospel presentation CD series, I think we ought to rejoice as well that folks were being reached for Christ, even if the motivation was pretty iffy.

And that brings me back to this Cree Catechism. Its a scroll, its in color, its visually very artfully done, and its theology seems to very much align with the Catholic church. Within the ELCA, we have uber huge and diverse educational offerings, in many ways, I think we are way ahead of most other churches, especially in breadth… yet for envangelism tools, we still seem lacking, especially in reaching out to the unchurched. No Lutheran church should ever have to default to the 4 laws and the problematic theology that goes with them. On the other hand, I do respect the churches that choose such a path… but then their evangelists need to do a pretty good job to explain out the problem areas, and even more so during follow up.